Told London
Scent With A Sense Of Place
It began, rather beautifully, with a drawer. Lillie grew up between the Seychelles and her grandparents' home in India, where her grandmother kept a dressing-table drawer of perfumes her grandfather had chosen for her over the years. Add Chris, whose six months travelling slowly through India and South East Asia left him with a habit of noticing how places smell, and you have Told London: candles and reed diffusers that capture real places, set in illustrated porcelain made to be kept.
Six places, all of them personal
The Wanderings Collection visits six places, and every one belongs to the founders' own story: London, where they built their careers; the English countryside, where they raised their family; Scotland, where they met at university; the Seychelles and India, where Lillie grew up; and Lake Como, where they live now. City Grandeur puts citrus and Earl Grey over a woody base in honour of London's parks, while Dancing Light, Lake Como, a Fragrance Foundation Awards finalist, pairs wisteria and jasmine with watery notes and a warm sandalwood finish.
Porcelain you will want to keep
Each fragrance comes in a porcelain vessel made with artisanal potteries, decorated with hand-drawn line illustrations of its place by the British artist Kerry Lemon and finished with an engraved solid metal lid. The scents are composed with world-class perfume houses including Givaudan, and the candles are hand-poured in the UK in 100% soy wax. When one burns down, a refill takes its place, and the porcelain carries on looking splendid on the shelf.
People who smell things for a living approve
The awards cabinet is filling up nicely: finalist at The Fragrance Foundation Awards, winner at the Pure Beauty Awards and winner again at the Attracta Beauty Awards in 2026. Fragrance writer Thomas Dunckley counts Told London among the few brands that get both the look and the scent exactly right, which is a lovely thing to hear from a man whose nose is his profession.
Consider yourself told
Have a browse through Candles + Home Fragrance, the wider Home + Decor collection, or Gifts, where an illustrated candle is always a welcome arrival. There are more Family Owned and Sustainable brands to discover, along with the rest of our British Brands, and if you are curious why the family part matters, we have written about what family-owned actually changes.
